The fast food chain Wendy's has a role to play in preventing a future in which antibiotics no longer work to protect our health.

The fast food chain Wendy's has a role to play in preventing a future in which antibiotics no longer work to protect our health.

As shareholders in the company gathered on June 4, U.S. PIRG Education Fund and other members of the Antibiotics Off the Menu coalition delivered a letter urging the company to end the overuse of antibiotics in its beef supply chain.

“If we continue to overuse antibiotics in human medicine and in agriculture, the drugs will lose their effectiveness and we will once again be powerless against dangerous bacteria,” said Laura Rogers, deputy director of the Antibiotic Resistance Action Center at the Milken Institute School of Public Health. “A world without antibiotics is almost unimaginable—it would send us back to the days where even a simple cut to the knee could be life-threatening.”

"Companies such as Wendy’s should feel obliged to help solve that problem by cutting antibiotic use in their supply chains,” said Matt Wellington, director of our Stop the Overuse of Antibiotics campaign.